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Actors and Geometry

A definition of Actors and how they are used in level design, including placement and manipulation techniques.

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An Actor is any object that can be placed into a level, such as a Camera, static mesh, or player start location. Actors support 3D transformations such as translation, rotation, and scaling. They can be created (spawned) and destroyed through gameplay code (C++ or Blueprints).

In C++, AActor is the base class of all Actors.

No matter the type of Actor you are using in your level - be it a light, a Static Mesh, a Particle System Emitter Actor, or anything else - you will need to know a few basics on how to create and manipulate them in your scenes.

This involves a few integral tasks: placing Actors, selecting Actors, positioning Actors, and modifying Actors. In other words, to create a level, Actors will be placed into a map, moved around to create an environment, and their properties will be modified to cause them to look or behave appropriately.

Working with Actors

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Placing Actors

Shows how you can place Actors such as props, lights, and cameras into your Level.

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Actor Mobility

Setting that controls whether an Actor will be allowed to move or change in some way during gameplay.

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Selecting Actors

Overview of methods available for selecting Actors in the Level Editor viewports.

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Transforming Actors

How to modify the location, rotation, and scale of Actors in a Level.

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Grouping Actors

How to create and work with groups of Actors in Unreal Engine

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Actor Snapping

Overview of Actor snapping in Unreal Engine

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Actor Merging

An overview of the Actor Merge tool that is used to combine multiple Static Meshes into a single mesh inside UE4.

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Coordinate Space Terminology

Explanations of the various coordinate spaces used in Unreal Engine.

Actor Types

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Common Actor Types

Listing and descriptions of common types of Actors used in levels.

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3D Text

Guide to placing 3D Text in Unreal Editor, and using it to create motion graphics.

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Geometry Brush Actors

Guide to using Brushes to create level geometry in Unreal Editor.

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Static Mesh Actors

Guide to placing and working with StaticMeshActors for creating world geometry in your environments.

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Skeletal Mesh Actors

Creating and using Skeletal Mesh Actors

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Camera Actors

Guide to placing and using Camera Actors within the Editor.

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Player Start

Guide to using Player Starts.

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Decal Actor User Guide

A guide to using the Deferred Decal actor.

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Trigger Actors

Actor that can be activated and cause events to occur in the level.

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Volumes Reference

Guide to placing and working with Volumes to augment the behavior and setup of your levels.

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Target Point Actors

Guide to creating and using Target Actors.

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